Event to Explore Process Serving Standards for Debt Collection

A process serving firm focusing on the debt collection industry will be holding an event this summer to initiate voluntary standards and best practices specifically for the ARM industry’s process serving.

JJL Process Corp., which specializes in serving collection papers, will host the Process Serving Standards Summit in Denver in July. The idea for an industry-wide summit that focused on voluntary standards was the brainchild of JJL President, Scott Levine.

“My thought was that it is better to develop voluntary standards proactively before various government entities take the initiative as has already been happening in other areas of the collection industry,” said Levine. “If the industry has its own voluntary standards, any time a government organization becomes involved, we can as a group hold up the list of standards that we developed so we can steer the regulatory agenda in our direction.”

Process serving in debt collection lawsuits has already attracted the attention of federal regulators.

The FTC’s series of roundtables in 2009 focused on litigation in the debt collection industry. Participants from the collection industry, consumer advocacy, the judiciary, and academia, debated over several different points; but one area they were in general agreement on is that the legal collections often faces a hurdle when it comes to process servers.

Among the ideas floated at the time were the use of cell phone cameras [to show proof of delivery], smart phone applications, and other measures to ensure that the proper people are served with collection suits and related notices. But there has been little movement on the codification of standards for ARM process serving.

JJL said it has received very positive feedback from debt buyers, legal networks, law firms, and large creditors to the idea of a standards summit.

The company expects to have an agenda and an advisory board finalized and announced next month. The Process Serving Standards Summit is anticipated to be a day and a half long event. Anyone interested in getting direct information on the summit as it becomes available should visit www.processservingstandards.com or email Joel Rosenthal at joel.rosenthal@jjlprocess.com.